News + Media

	In the News November 8, 2007 Bitter Friends, Bosom Enemies: Iran, the US, and the Twisted Path to Confrontation CIS and the Iranian Studies Group at MIT featured a public discussion with Barbara Slavin, chief diplomatic correspondent, USA Today, on her new book on Iran and the United States. Since 1996, Slavin has been responsible for analyzing foreign news and U.S. foreign policy for USA Today. She has covered such key issues as the U.S.-led war on terrorism, policy toward "rogue" states, the reform movement in Iran and the Arab-Israeli conflict. She has also accompanied two secretaries of state on their official travels and reported from Libya, Israel, Egypt, North Korea, Russia, China, Saudi Arabia and Syria.
	Audit November 1, 2007 Russia and America: is another arms race afoot? Jane MO Sharp, Kings College London During the Cold War years we learned that successful arms control agreements with the Soviet Union were those that codified parity, or at least a mutually acceptable status quo. After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Treaty Organization (WTO) in 1991, a much diminished Russia saw all its WTO allies and three former Soviet republics join NATO, making parity harder to achieve.
	Audit November 1, 2007 Is Port Security funding making us safer? Veronique de Rugy, George Mason University The most terrifying security threat to security experts and the public alike is nuclear proliferation. Once the figment of Hollywood imagination, the ultimate nightmare scenario that is discussed by some as inevitable is the detonation of a nuclear device on American soil.
	In the News November 1, 2007 After Bush: the case for restraint Barry PosenThe American Interest From November 2007 until election day 2008, the American Interest is examining questions of strategy, tone and tactics over a range of issues facing the next presidential administration. Barry Posen's "Case for Restraint" is first in this series.
	Analysis + Opinion October 30, 2007 An inspiration against nuclear arms John TirmanBoston Globe In 1980, she invented the call to freeze the nuclear arms race, and this simple but compelling idea - essentially, a moratorium on new nuclear weapons as a prelude to gradual disarmament - became the rallying cry for millions of people sickened by the rush to develop and deploy new nuclear weapons and missiles, space weapons, stealth bombers, and all the other expensive, provocative gadgets of the arms industry.
	In the News October 3, 2007 The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy The CIS Starr Forum featured a public discussion with John Mearsheimer (University of Chicago) and Stephen Walt (Harvard University) on their recent book “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy.” Joining the authors was Bruce Riedel (Brookings Institution). The event was held on Wednesday, October 3, from 6:00–7:30 p.m. in the Kirsch auditorium (Stata Center, Rm. 32-123). Visit the Starr Forum web site for videos on past events and a calendar of upcoming events.
	Audit October 1, 2007 Who failed whom? Assessing the UN’s human rights efforts Balakrishnan Rajagopal, MIT Several months ago, during the finalization of the plan to replace the United Nations’ Commission on Human Rights with the new UN Human Rights Council, John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, said with characteristic flourish, “We want a butterfly..."
	Audit October 1, 2007 Distracted at the creation: Washington’s China policy Christopher P. Twomey, Naval Postgraduate School U.S. China policy in the beginning of the twenty-first century is greater than the sum of diplomatic initiatives and presidential statements. Since China’s rise is reshaping global politics, U.S. policy should be evaluated in this larger context. Washington must not only handle its relationship with China on a day-to-day basis, but must also lay the foundations for a long-term response to its rise.
	Analysis + Opinion September 2, 2007 The rogue that plays by the rules Edward S. SteinfeldWashington Post As many Americans understand the country, China is trouble for its own people and all the rest of us. Its government is hell-bent on development but provides none of the checks expected of a healthy market system: a free press, an independent judiciary, meaningful property rights and a real legislature. Institutionally deficient and stuck in the past, China is unprepared to deal with the future and to work within the rules of fair play that bind the world's most advanced economies -- or so the conventional wisdom suggests.
	Audit September 1, 2007 'New fighting power!' for Japan? Richard Samuels, MIT Japanese strategists struggled for decades to find a way to field a robust military despite legal, political, and normative constraints on the expansion of the Self-Defense Forces (SDF). Their progress was steady and significant, but slow. Now, leveraging off (and playing up) a perceived shift in the nature of the threat Japan faces, they have found a less constrained and highly efficacious route to force transformation.